Comic Recommendation: Rat Queens

Who are the Rat Queens? A pack of booze-guzzling, death-dealing battle maidens-for-hire, and they’re in the business of killing all gods’ creatures for profit. A new ongoing series from writer Peter Panzerfaust’s Kurtis J. Wiebe and artist Roc Upchurch. This story is basically a darkly comedic fantasy series starring Hannah the Rockabilly Elven Mage, Violet the Hipster Dwarven Fighter, Dee the Atheist Human Cleric and Betty the Hippy Hobbit Thief. As Image describes it, this is a modern spin on an old school genre is a violent monster-killing epic that is like Buffy meets Tank Girl in a Lord of the Rings world on crack.

What’s so fun is that this group of fem fatales are known for causing trouble around town and find themselves thrown in the dungeon yet again. Securing their release by completing a quest. One that if they fail, they are banned from Palisade forever. This is how the story starts, and it only gets better from there. Their language as well is something you can’t help but enjoy as you read, so much foul arguments which you just couldn’t repeat in public.

Their interactions with the rest of this world are just as engaging too. Between the townspeople and in addition to the Rat Queens, we have Peaches, Four Daves, Brother Ponies, and Obsidian Darkness. Of course we still know little about them, but too early for us to be that familiar with who they are on that level.

You just have to admire the style of the story as well, looks real enough yet also makes you feel as if they are playing some game. Aside from this the setting is something you see captured well as it looks like something straight out of an RPG world from the villages, the town, to taverns. Overall Upchurch is who really sells this as a fantasy tale, with that semi-medieval feel.

If you were an MMO/RPG fan, you’d feel as if this book is calling you back into that world you probably gave up years ago. That is the feeling you get from the first two issues of this book and it’s a fun journey. Quests, bar fights, assassins, and just pure violence is just scratching the surface of what this book delivers on so far. Rat Queens is the book you should be reading if you want to see action. Entertaining from start to finish this book is very recommended as yet another book Image has debuted of high quality. This is a serious story that still has fun with it at the same time. All characters are likable and that much is reason to invest your time into such a tale of fantasy. Especially knowing it is one of the many new books out there with female leads. A good change in direction of the many stories we are exposed to today.

Jideobi is the Comic Editor at Analog Addiction where he writes all things comics and comic related(especially if X-Men). Also follow him on Twitter @Siphen0.